


Everything I Ever Thought I Knew

by Inkelf



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Child Abandonment, Daddy Issues, F/M, Father-Son Relationship, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-04
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:08:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23013760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkelf/pseuds/Inkelf
Summary: Turns out the Dark Kingdom has their own lost royal too. | Eugene finds out about the Dark Kingdom's king and the child he sent away before  meeting him.
Relationships: Edmund & Eugene Fitzherbert | Flynn Rider, Eugene Fitzherbert | Flynn Rider/Rapunzel
Comments: 10
Kudos: 55





	1. A Rogue, A Thief, A Joker

**Author's Note:**

> The pacing of the last episode or two of the second season has always bothered me a little bit. This will be mainly canon compliant (at least for now), just with more foreshadowing and lead up to the "dark prince" reveal.

The first time they heard of the lost prince, Eugene laughed.  
"Man, people in this side of the world keep misplacing their royals, don't they?"  
Lance laughs, but Rapunzel gives him that look, that one where she's slightly exasperated with him, understood he was making a joke, but he maybe went a little too far. _"Eugene."_  
"Sorry," Eugene said, to the shopkeeper, but mainly to Rapunzel.  
Rapunzel squeezed his hand in appreciation. "We've never heard of the lost prince," she clarified, glancing at the shopkeeper's shrine in curiosity.  
The shopkeeper, who appeared torn between being miffed and confused at what Euegene had said, bobbed her head to Rapunzel. "It's a tale the dark kingdom doesn't like to tell." She bent over her stall, settling her elbows amongst the wares there, with a conspiring look that made Cass sigh that they were going to waste time over this, Eugene shift more comfortably on his feet because he knew Rapunzel, and Rapunzel indeed lean forward eagerly with eyes alight. "What do you mean?"  
"Well, my mother grew up in the dark kingdom you see," the shopkeeper started. "She was about my age when the rumours started circulating--" She broke off abruptly with a low cry of outrage, jabbing a finger in Lance's direction, where he was currently two bites into a giant muffin, his face speckled with evidence of a missing jelly tart as well. "Excuse me?! You have to pay for those!"  
Cass whipped out the fare, slammed it on the table, then grabbed Rapunzel's arm and started leading her away, cutting off Rapunzel's protest with, "Thanks so much, have a nice rest of your day!"  
Eugene grabbed Lance by the collar and started dragging him after Rapunzel and Cass, giving his friend a dark glare. _"Seriously?"_  
"Whaaattt?" Lance protested, muffled through a mouthful of muffin. "Stories make me hungry!"  
Eugene rolled his eyes and quickened his pace to catch up with the women, old habits of scanning with his peripheral vision to ensure no friendly local law enforcement were following them coming in quite handy.  
But thankfully, perhaps luckily, they made it out of town to the wagon with their only casualty Rapunzel's excitement for a good story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh and I ditched Shorty because I really don't want to write him. This is after they left Hookfoot too. I use canon compliant loosely- I'm not going to rewrite every episode, more just pop things in here and there between episodes up til the finale. At that point I may decide to divert canon with the moonstone, but I've got no solid plans yet. I wrote this on the bus on my way to work. Should I probably wait to post it to guarantee I'll actually write more? Probably, rip.


	2. No Place To Call My Own

The second time the lost prince came up, Eugene was _almost_ interested.  
The caravan had broken down _again,_ but this time fortunately it wasn't too far outside a bustling little village with folks who were happy to help, and excited to just see visitors.  
While Cass ordered the supplies necessary to fix their home-away-from-home, she gave an eyeroll and a stiff nod of (something a little like) approval to Eugene, jerking her head towards Rapunzel, who was eyeing a little bookshop. Eugene returned the nod in appreciation and crossed over to Rapunzel, slipping his hand into hers. "Come on, Blondie," he said with a smile. "Let's go check out that bookshop, huh?"  
Rapunzel's eyes lit up as she looked up at him, squeezing his hand. "Can we? I didn't think Cass wanted us to split up--"  
"She nodded at me, which I'm pretty sure is the nicest thing she's ever said to me, so I'm going to take that as a yes."  
Rapunzel grinned, and in retrospect, Eugene _should_ have expected her to sprint across the marketplace, dragging him along behind her, but the startled yelp he left behind as he scrambled to catch up with the hand she was holding made her giggle. Which was almost worth the humiliation of yelping in public.  
The bookshop was not _quite_ cheery-- it seemed the closer they got to the dark kingdom, the darker the colors of everything got-- but Rapunzel was captivated anyway. Eugene always loved watching the way her light up when she was excited, and he relinquished her hand to let her move more freely around the shop. Books held a special magic for her he knew, and something tightened in his stomach like it always did when he thought about how Gothel had kept her locked away her entire life-- Rapunzel had thought there were only three books in the entire world until she had escaped the tower.  
A dark blue, thin book half-falling off the shelf caught his eye, and at first he started to push it back into its place until the scrawled name on the spine caught his eye.  
_The Lost Son of the Moonstone._  
Eugene frowned, and pried it out from between the other titles it was wedged between. The book appeared handmade, the title on the spine and cover were certainly handwritten.  
Flipping it open to a random page, Eugene scanned the words, curious and wondering if there would be anything here that could help Rapunzel with discovering the truth behind the moonstone.  
The page he had opened to held a scrawling sketch of a tall, dark, but certainly not handsome castle, imposing and rocky even when made of ink on paper.  
"Very homey," Eugene muttered, shifting to lean more comfortably against the bookshelf.  
Either he was too heavy, or the shelf was too unsteady, because a moment later with a series of spectacular clatters, bangs, thumps and the second yelp of the day, Eugene found himself on his back, half on top of the felled shelf, and surrounded by disgruntled books, a very worried Rapunzel, and a very irate shop owner.  
Which of course, was the moment Cassandra chose to walk through the door.  
She stopped right inside, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow. "Wow. This is impressive, even for you, Fitzherbert."  
Before Eugene could respond, or even pick his bruised body and ego off the floor, the irate shop owner stiffened and though a second ago, Eugene wouldn't have believed it possible, became even more irate.  
"Fitzherbert?" He sputtered. "Absolutely _not!"_ He swooped forward, eyes darkening when he saw the book in Eugene's hand, promptly snatching the book and hurling Eugene to his feet, shoving him with Rapunzel toward the door. "The shop is closed!"  
"We're so sorry, let us help you clean up--" Rapunzel started, but the shop owner barreled the couple into Cass and all three out the door, which was promptly slammed in their face. The door's bell dinged merrily, echoing into silence.  
The three of them stood there, stunned, until Cassandra broke the silence with, "What on earth did you _do?"_  
"I have no idea!" Eugene spluttered. "I leaned against a bookcase that was not up to current safety standards, let me tell you--"  
"I mean what did you do under the name Fitzherbert to get you violently thrown out of a bookshop?" Cass asked, somewhere between incredulously and amused.  
And that right there was the most troubling part.  
"I've never done anything under that name besides be an orphan and the princess' boyfriend," Eugene said, and he was suddenly too tired to even sound defensive. "I swear. I've never even been out here before." Something like the distress he was feeling must have shown on his face because Rapunzel wrapped her arms around him, and even Cass looked sorry for him, which was extremely irritating.  
"I'm sure it was just a misunderstanding," Rapunzel reassured him. "Lots of people have the same last name, I'm sure he just thought you were related to someone else."  
Eugene gave a weary smile. "Yeah. Must be." 

He didn't even remember the book, which back inside the store, the shop owner was hastily hiding away in a locked drawer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, two mornings in a row, that's gotta be worth somethin??


	3. Interlude: How Could I Have Known I Was Wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Interlude: Things that are yet to happen.

_Cold. That's how he would describe the dark kingdom. Not cold like that blizzard, or cold like a lake you fall into too late in the season._  
_But cold like a stone. When you place your hand on a smooth stone, even in the middle of the hottest summer, it's still cold.  
_ _Reaching down into the deepest stone, all that is at its heart is cold. Hard. Cold._

I promised her the prophecy was wrong. 

_At the end of Rapunzel's journey, one of her party shall turn against her._

_He had never been more wrong._

_And now all he felt was cold and stone._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay three for three, even though this one is really short. But I wanted to start toying with things that haven't happened yet in the main fic. Starting to think this is going to be more of an AU than I originally thought... We'll see what happens.  
> (Will probably not update over the weekend. Happy Friday everyone!)


	4. A Dream That I Could Share

In retrospect, Eugene should have expected a seashell house to be flat out crazy.  
He would have maybe expected a little less “mirror people that look like us trying to kill us” and “suddenly your adult friends are little children” crazy, but still. The crazy signs were there from the very purply-pink, giant seashore tourist trap start.  
“Do you think this is a real shell?” He asked, staring at the wall of the bedroom, giving it a skeptical look. “Like I know there are big things in the ocean, but how enormous would the slug that lived inside this have to be to fill it all out?”  
Rapunzel let out an amused little hum from where she was stretched out on the bed, sketching. “Slugs don’t have shells, Eugene. Snails do.”  
“Well, a snail without a shell is basically a slug, so I’m still right.”  
Rapunzel laughed, and he turned to face her, warmth filling him, and he put thoughts of the really, truly crazy that was this place and sat down on the edge of the bed beside her, smiling. She paused in whatever she was drawing to lift up her head to meet his as he lowered himself to rest his forehead against hers.  
“Today was weird, and long,” Eugene said, closing his eyes, content in this little moment.  
“It was,” Rapunzel agreed, sighing. “But we should just have to stay one more night.”  
“That’s two more nights than I’m comfortable with,” Eugene murmured, the flicker of contentment vanishing in unease. He laid down beside Rapunzel, putting his arm around her as though that would keep them safe.  
“We’ll be alright,” Rapunzel said softly. “We have each other to keep us safe.”  
Eugene nodded, though he was not as sure in their safety as she was. “Would you mind if I stayed here with you tonight?” he asked quietly. “I think I would feel better if I knew you weren’t alone— other than Pascal,” he added quickly at the green-eyed glare he quickly received from side table.  
Rapunzel’s smile softened. “Of course I don’t mind,” she said softly, a touch of pink on her cheeks.  
Eugene returned her smile, reaching out to brush some of her hair back from her face. “And now if I get cold, I can use your hair as a blanket,” he teased, which made Rapunzel laugh again.  
“Let’s get some rest,” Rapunzel said, setting aside her journal and turning to give Pascal a kiss on the forehead before settling under the blankets and turning to give Eugene a tender kiss.  
“Sleep,” Eugene agreed, returning the kiss and lying down. “And dream of home.” 

Eugene wished his dreams had been of home, instead of the cold, unintelligible spires of blue and black, with whispers _What of the child? The child is innocent—_ echoing in the halls of emptiness he found himself alone in a dream castle made of stone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyy everyone. Life kinda got crazy with the whole not the kind of Corona we like thing, and my creative energy kind of dried up. Started poking at this and other fic ideas again though, though I'm not promising I'll be able to post regularly again, but here's another little chapter and I'm working on the next at least.


End file.
